Sunday, August 16, 2009

Armstrong wins Leadville on a flat tire

SHOOT: Wiens finished in 6:57.02 , 29 minutes behind Lance. Lance suffered a flat tire less than 10 miles from the finish.

"I don't normally change flats. I call up the car and they change it — that's how it works in road cycling," Armstrong said. "Changing a tire is the most embarrassing thing ever for me. ... I didn't want to have to be in that position, so I just put some more air in it. Then I was like, screw it, I'll just ride it home."

"It killed me," Wiens said. "This will be a memorable race for me because I was saying to myself, 'This is athletic suicide, for me to be with these guys. Why am I up here? I hope these other guys are hurting as bad. I know Lance is probably feeling pretty comfortable, but if (Sontagg) can hold this pace the entire way through then he's a superhuman guy." But I had a feeling he was going to be cooked, and he was. But he hurt all of us, except Lance, I think."

"There were probably six or seven guys on the way out, then guys just kept dropping off," Armstrong said. "So I sort of had to decide what to do: if you wait for other guys or if you just sort of go for the rest of race by yourself. It was a little risky to do that. In the end you're wasted, but I rolled the dice a little bit. Plus I was freezing. I wanted to start riding hard because I was about to freeze."
clipped from www.google.com

LEADVILLE, Colo. — Lance Armstrong has won the Leadville 100 in a record time, finishing the nation's highest-altitude mountain bike race on a flat tire.

Armstrong dethroned six-time defending champion Dave Wiens on Saturday, winning in 6 hours, 28 minutes, 50 seconds. Wiens had set the previous record of 6:45:45.

He had beaten the seven-time Tour de France winner by nearly two minutes last year. But that was before Armstrong began training in earnest for his return to the Tour this year.

Armstrong and Wiens were in a pack of pro racers that broke away early. The race featured 1,400 mostly amateur cyclists and began with snow-crested peaks as a backdrop.

blog it

No comments: